Punjab, state of India, located in the northwestern part of the subcontinent. It is bounded by the Indian states of Jammu and Kashmir to the north, Himachal Pradesh to the northeast, Haryana to the south and southeast, and Rajasthan to the southwest and by the country of Pakistan to the west. Punjab in its present form came into existence on November 1, 1966, when most of its predominantly Hindi-speaking areas were separated to form the new state of Haryana. The city of Chandigarh, within the Chandigarh union territory, is the joint capital of Punjab and Haryana.

The word Punjab is a compound of two Persian words, panj (“five”) and āb (“water”), thus signifying the land of five waters, or rivers (the Beas, Chenab, Jhelum, Ravi, and Sutlej). The word’s origin can perhaps be traced to panca nada, Sanskrit for “five rivers” and the name of a region mentioned in the ancient epic the Mahabharata. As applied to the present Indian state of Punjab, however, it is a misnomer: since the partition of India in 1947, only two of those rivers, the Sutlej and the Beas, lie within Punjab’s territory, while the Ravi flows only along part of its western border. Area 19,445 square miles (50,362 square km). Pop. (2011) 27,704,236.

Land

Relief, drainage, and soils

Punjab spans three physiographic regions, the smallest being the Siwalik Range in the northeast, where elevations reach about 3,000 feet (900 metres). Farther south, the narrow, undulating foothill region is dissected by closely spaced seasonal torrents, locally known as chos, several of which terminate in the plain below without joining any stream. To the south and west of the foothills lies the broad flat tract, with low-lying floodplains separated by slightly elevated uplands. This region, with its fertile alluvial soils, slopes gently from an elevation of about 900 feet (275 metres) in the northeast to about 550 feet (170 metres) in the southwest. The southwestern part of the plains, formerly strewn with sand dunes, has mostly been levelled off with the expansion of irrigation projects.

Climate

Punjab has an inland subtropical location, and its climate is continental, being semiarid to subhumid. Summers are very hot. In June, the warmest month, daily temperatures in Ludhiana usually reach about 100 °F (upper 30s C) from a low in the upper 70s F (mid-20s C). In January, the coolest month, daily temperatures normally rise from the mid-40s (about 7 °C) into the mid-60s F (upper 10s C). Annual rainfall is highest in the Siwalik Range, which may receive more than 45 inches (1,150 mm), and lowest in the southwest, which may receive less than 12 inches (300 mm); statewide average annual precipitation is roughly 16 inches (400 mm). Most of the annual rainfall occurs from July to September, the months of the southwest monsoon. Winter rains from the western cyclones, occurring from December to March, account for less than one-fourth of the total rainfall.

Plant and animal life

With the growth of human settlement over the centuries, Punjab has been cleared of most of its forest cover. Over large parts of the Siwalik Range, bush vegetation has succeeded trees as a result of extensive deforestation. There have been attempts at reforestation on the hillsides, and eucalyptus trees have been planted along major roads.

Natural habitats for wildlife are severely limited because of intense competition from agriculture. Even so, many types of rodents (such as mice, rats, squirrels, and gerbils), bats, birds, and snakes, as well as some species of monkeys, have adapted to the farming environment. Larger mammals, including jackals, leopards, wild boar, various types of deer, civets, and pangolins (scaly anteaters), among others, are found in the Siwaliks.

People

Population composition

The people of Punjab are mainly descendants of the so-called Aryan tribes that entered India from the northwest during the 2nd millennium bce, as well as the pre-Aryan population, probably Dravidians (speakers of Dravidian languages), who had a highly developed civilization. Relics of this civilization have been unearthed at Rupnagar (Ropar). Successive waves of invaders—Greeks, Parthians, Kushans, and Hephthalites (Hunas)—added to the diversity of earlier social, or caste, groups (jatis). Later, invaders under the banner of Islam forced several vanquished groups (such as the Jat peasant caste and the Rajput class of landowners) to convert to the Muslim faith, although many conversions were voluntary under the influence of Sufi saints.

Today, however, the majority religion of Punjab is Sikhism, which originated from the teachings of Nanak, the first Sikh Guru. Hindus make up the largest minority, but there also is a significant population of Muslims. There are small communities of Christians and Jains in some areas. Some two-fifths of Punjab’s population consists of Hindus and Sikhs who officially belong to the Scheduled Castes (formerly called “untouchables”), which occupy a relatively low position within the traditional Indian caste system.

Punjabi is the official state language. Along with Hindi, it is the most widely spoken. However, many people also speak English and Urdu.

Settlement patterns

About one-third of Punjab’s population lives in cities and towns. Its major cities are Ludhiana in the central region, Amritsar in the northwest, Jalandhar in north-central Punjab, Patiala in the southeast, and Bathinda in the south-central part of the state. Muslims reside mostly in and around the southwest-central city of Maler Kotla, which was once the centre of a princely state ruled by a Muslim nawab (provincial governor).

Economy

Agriculture

Some two-fifths of Punjab’s population is engaged in the agricultural sector, which accounts for a significant segment of the state’s gross product. Punjab produces an important portion of India’s food grain and contributes a major share of the wheat and rice stock held by the Central Pool (a national repository system of surplus food grain). Much of the state’s agricultural progress and productivity is attributable to the so-called Green Revolution, an international movement launched in the 1960s that introduced not only new agricultural technologies but also high-yielding varieties of wheat and rice.

Aside from wheat and rice, corn (maize), barley, and pearl millet are important cereal products of Punjab. Although the yield of pulses (legumes) has declined since the late 20th century, there has been a rapid increase in the commercial production of fruit, especially citrus, mangoes, and guavas. Other major crops include cotton, sugarcane, oilseeds, chickpeas, peanuts (groundnuts), and vegetables.

With almost the entire cultivated area receiving irrigation, Punjab is among India’s most widely irrigated states. Government-owned canals and wells are the main sources of irrigation; canals are most common in southern and southwestern Punjab, while wells are more typical of the north and the northeast. The Bhakra Dam project in neighbouring Himachal Pradesh provides much of Punjab’s supply of irrigation water.

Click anywhere inside the article to add text or insert superscripts, subscripts, and special characters.
You can also highlight a section and use the tools in this bar to modify existing content:

Add links to related Britannica articles!
You can double-click any word or highlight a word or phrase in the text below and then select an article from the search box.
Or, simply highlight a word or phrase in the article, then enter the article name or term you'd like to link to in the search box below, and select from the list of results.

Note: we do not allow links to external resources in editor.
Please click the Web sites link for this article to add citations for
external Web sites.